Several situations exist in which an individual is acoustically isolated from an external environment. One of the issues with earpieces is they may block the external auditory canal thereby preventing a user from hearing ambient sounds. Sometimes, this is desired and beneficial, but sometimes it is not. The isolation often results in inefficiency or inconvenience. One primary isolation situation arises from the use of earpieces. A wide variety of traditional earpieces exist for noise abatement or for listening to an audio source or communication. Earpieces can be utilized for maintaining communication in a high ambient sound environment, such as in an aircraft cockpit, stadium, and so forth.
Therefore, a need exists for the development of methods for controlling acoustic isolation, so important events are not missed, and non-important noises can be properly identified and ignored. What is needed is a system and method of substantially preventing ambient sounds from reaching the user's tympanic membranes while providing the user with the option to permit the ambient sounds the user desires to listen to.